Decree Days are Back

Funky food for hungry demonstrators.

Hustling Artists Banned

Paris:- Monday, 15. February 2003:- The times
continue to be strange in France. Last spring, due to a
campaign bungle, the left was forced to vote massively for
the re-election of France's right-wing president, Jacques
Chirac, for a second term.

Since then the mayor of Bordeaux, Alain Juppé,
has spearheaded a drive to unite the right-wing parties
under the single banner of the UMP - the 'Union pour une
Majorité Présidential.' The last 'p' may
stand for 'Populaire,' but if so, it is wishful
thinking.

Another moderate right-wing party, the UDF, led by
François Bayrou, does not want his party to be part
of the UMP. In a recent by-election, the candidate put up
by the UDF was elected, beating the UMP's candidate.

For this - to reduce 'infinite' choice - the Prime
Minister, Jean-Pierre Raffarin, introduced a 'reform' law
to change the electoral code concerning regional and
European elections. This new rule would eliminate
candidates who do not gather more votes than 10 percent of
the registered voters - which could prevent the smaller
parties from having a chance of electing anybody.

François Bayrou then called a meeting of minor
party chiefs of all 'wings' - who had asked their
supporters to vote for Chirac instead of Jean-Marie Le Pan
in last spring's presidential election.

These included the leaders of the Greens, an opposition
Socialist-oriented candidate, two Communists, and several
right-wing leaders including the hunters and fishermen -
but excluded anybody connected with the Front National even
if they opposed Jean-Marie Le Pen. No UMP, Socialist or
Communist Party bigwigs attended the meeting.

The meeting resulted in 12,000 parliamentary amendments
to the proposed 'reform' law. The prime minister,
Jean-Pierre Raffarin, characterized this as obstruction,
and used the article 49-3 to pass the 'reform' by
decree.

This article, which was never used by Lionel Jospin's
government, permits the majority in the Assembly National
to pass laws without discussion or a vote. This law was
last used in June of 1996, by Alain Juppé, when he
was Prime Minister - to change the status of France
Télécom.

The change in the law is just as likely to benefit the
Socialist Party as the majority UMP, to the detriment of
all other minor expressions of difference. Most decried,
was the tendency toward a two-party system.

The parliamentary leader of the UDF has said his party
intends to put up 22 candidates in 22 regions for the next
round of elections.

There were two reasons evoked by the prime minister for
not devoting 170 hours of parliamentary time to discussing
the 12,000 amendments to the election law.

First, he said he could not 'spare' the valuable time of
the minister of the interior who is engaged in the fight
against terrorism - and second, the cloud of an impending
war against Iraq is getting darker.

Is It True What
the French Think?

France's parliament has not been engaged in any official
discussions about a possible war involving Iraq because
this problem is being managed by Président Chirac
and by his foreign minister, Dominique de Villepin.

Newspaper reports are saying most elected deputies of
all parties fully support the French chief of state's
approach to the situation.

According to a poll by the CSA Institute for Le Parisien
conducted after the US Secretary of State Colin Powell
presented the US evidence of Iraq's misdeeds to the UN
Security Council on Wednesday, 5. February - the 'evidence'
was received with skepticism by 74 percent of the
French

At the same time 77 percent of the French polled said
they opposed a US military intervention in Iraq. After this
last weekend, polls now put the 'opposed' percentage at
over 80.

In a similar poll conducted in January of 1991, 71
percent of the French polled approved of an international
intervention to settle the crises caused by the Iraqi
invasion of Kuwait.

On Saturday in Paris between 150,000 and a
quarter-million turned out for a peace march from
Denfert-Rochereau to Bastille under frigid but true blue
skies. The leaders of the parade reached the Place de la
Bastille before the all the followers of it left the
starting point.

However, the Paris demo was handily outnumbered by
similar protest marches in London, Madrid and Rome, the
capital cities of countries whose leaders are the closest
supporters of the US position.

Even adding the numbers who marched in 72 other French
towns and cities to the total, does not bring the mass up
to the turnout in Rome. Worldwide, including in the United
States, perhaps 10 million marched on Saturday.

Conspicuously absent from Saturday's demo were France's
right-wing leaders, who seem to be adept at managing to
lack visible support for France's chief of state, or for
the state of French opinion.

The Socialist-inspired motion of censure against the use
of the article 49-3 to bulldoze electoral 'reform' into law
was easily defeated during the Assembly's Saturday session
because the right-wing enjoys a comfortable
majority.

Going Bust Gains Popularity

For some unknown reason company closings and the
resulting lay-offs of workers are called 'plans sociaiaux'
here. I think there actually used to be plans in place to
recycle workers into new jobs.

It is possible that these no longer function because bankruptcies are becoming too frequet to
absorb the hapless employees. Hardly a day passes without
the announcement of another factory closing - and these are
often in provincial areas where the factory in question is
the only major employer.